Stop the California Solar Tax • Hacker News Board

People are being charged for having solar panels? I understand there needs to be a fee for hooking up to the grid etc., but I think here you get that and more back by feeding excess energy to it.

Could residence of those states get off the grid and instead install many large batteries?

I don't know a lot about this stuff :)

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#14

Post by Andys » Wed, Jan 12, 2022, 7:56 AM UTC

Australia was an early mass adopter of suburban rooftop solar and a similar issue played out here.

It turns out that the cost of building and maintaining the grid is the majority of the cost of electricity to the home. As the cost of actual kWh trends to zero, the cost of the grid becomes the dominant cost.

If households with solar want to use the grid effectively as a battery, that has a defined and quite high cost, and has to be paid no matter how you structure it (monthly fee, tax, etc)

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#15

Post by cinntaile » Wed, Jan 12, 2022, 1:43 PM UTC

afrazkhan wrote: post #13

As a European, I have to ask the obvious question: What? People are being charged for having solar panels? I understand there needs to be a fee for hooking up to the grid etc., but I think here you get that and more back by feeding excess energy to it. Could residence of those states get off the grid and instead install many large batteries? I don't know a lot about this stuff :)

The problem is not unique to California and exists in Europe as well. The problem is that you use the infrastructure but essentially don't pay to invest and maintain it, to fix this you need to see solar that feeds back to the grid as a producer (because that's the case) and pay some sort of producer fee when you feed back.

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#16

Post by hellisothers » Wed, Jan 12, 2022, 4:48 PM UTC

Andys wrote: post #14

Australia was an early mass adopter of suburban rooftop solar and a similar issue played out here. It turns out that the cost of building and maintaining the grid is the majority of the cost of electricity to the home. As the cost of actual kWh trends to zero, the cost of the grid becomes the dominant cost. If households with solar want to use the grid effectively as a battery, that has a defined and quite high cost,…

Thank you, this seems obvious to me now that you said it but it hadn’t occurred to me before. I still dislike the way this is being handled as it effectively discourages solar but am at least now sympathetic to the counter argument.

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#17

Post by sliken » Wed, Jan 12, 2022, 9:04 PM UTC

invalidname wrote: post #8

This is Tesla trying to get the tax payers to fund the rich: https://www.nrdc.org/experts/mohit-chhabra/debunking-myths-s... The fact is that this tax will help solar and help poorer families make money from it. Instead of subsidies going to the rich.

There's a long history of hiding costs resulting in poor outcomes.

Seems insane to charge folks $8 per Kw, when the power company is buying power at commodity rates (typically a few cents per KwH), and reselling it at full price (typically $0.14 to $0.30 per KwH depending on ToU (Time of Use)).

There used to be a large subsidy, where solar users would get the full price for each KwH generated and returned to the grid. This did damage the grid, was not sustainable, and put additional costs to non-solar users.

However that's gone, so now solar production gets paid a small fraction of the value of the power, but can still decrease their power bill, decrease their grid usage, and help out everyone else on the grid by providing carbon free power.

There should be (and is) a charge for connecting to the grid, that should be paid for by all grid users (with and without solar) and those funds should help maintain the grid.

I don't get what is trying to be "fixed" by this tax. Doubly so with PG&E, which has a history of asking for billions to improve the grid, then not spending it on improving the grid.

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#18

Post by Andys » Wed, Jan 12, 2022, 10:52 PM UTC

hellisothers wrote: post #16

Andys wrote: post #14

Australia was an early mass adopter of suburban rooftop solar and a similar issue played out here. It turns out that the cost of building and maintaining the grid is the majority of the cost of electricity to the home. As the cost of actual kWh trends to zero, the cost of the grid becomes the dominant cost. If households with solar want to use the grid effectively as a battery, that has a defined and quite high cost,…

Thank you, this seems obvious to me now that you said it but it hadn’t occurred to me before. I still dislike the way this is being handled as it effectively discourages solar but am at least now sympathetic to the counter argument.

Yeah - they shouldn't use it as a tax while still in the early adoption phase.

But as costs of having power delivered to your home are rising even as the generation cost falls, it is important to have some kind of support for low income families.

There could be ways to lower the cost of the grid maintenance, but there's always going to have to be a connection fee.

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#19

Post by colordrops » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 7:52 AM UTC

invalidname wrote: post #8

This is Tesla trying to get the tax payers to fund the rich: https://www.nrdc.org/experts/mohit-chhabra/debunking-myths-s... The fact is that this tax will help solar and help poorer families make money from it. Instead of subsidies going to the rich.

How does this help solar? I've got an 11kW system that makes about 7kW mid-summer due to shade and angle of the sun. The tax would be over $100 a month for my installation, negating any value of it, subsidy or not.

And considering the trillions of subsidies going to the war machine, oil, corn syrup and other corrupt industries, we should be putting MORE, not less money into something that addresses climate change. Our civilization is in a dire situation.

We shouldn't cut off our nose to spite our face. If poor people aren't able to participate, then we should put even more money into it so they can.

This proposal is plain stupid.

Re: Stop the California Solar Tax

#20

Post by colordrops » Thu, Jan 13, 2022, 7:57 AM UTC

cinntaile wrote: post #15

afrazkhan wrote: post #13

As a European, I have to ask the obvious question: What? People are being charged for having solar panels? I understand there needs to be a fee for hooking up to the grid etc., but I think here you get that and more back by feeding excess energy to it. Could residence of those states get off the grid and instead install many large batteries? I don't know a lot about this stuff :)

The problem is not unique to California and exists in Europe as well. The problem is that you use the infrastructure but essentially don't pay to invest and maintain it, to fix this you need to see solar that feeds back to the grid as a producer (because that's the case) and pay some sort of producer fee when you feed back.

That's not true. If you are connected to the grid you absolutely pay fees already. Even if the fees aren't enough, they should be increased and equal per customer with or without solar. Questions: Why is it tied to installation sized rather than per installation? Why is the tax so crazy high per kW (it negates the entire value proposition for solar installations)? Why aren't we putting more money and doing more to encourage solar rather than the opposite considering the climate change cliff we are about to drive off of and California's budget surplus? Why is PG&E allowed to lobby politicians at all? Why isn't PG&E being challenged for not upgrading infrastructure with the billions they receive?

Are they just expecting home owners to buy solar installations out of the goodness of their hearts to save the planet, considering that it will make no financial sense to buy them anymore?